*SAMPLE LETTER TO YOUR STATE LEGISLATORS*
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Dear [State Legislator],
As usual, the federal government is failing to protect us from pesticides.
More than 60 other countries have banned Syngenta/ChemChina’s atrazine, but it’s the second most widely used herbicide used in the United States and it’s the number-one pesticide that shows up in our drinking water. One-fifth of the surface water that we draw on for drinking water is contaminated with atrazine.
The current U.S. drinking water standard for atrazine is 3 ppb, but atrazine can chemically castrate frogs at 0.1 ppb.
Atrazine is an endocrine disruptor. That means it fouls up our body’s regulation of reproductive hormones, the brain and the nervous system, as well as metabolism and blood sugar. That’s why atrazine is implicated in a range of health problems, including:
- Horrific birth defects like gastroschisis, where the newborn’s intestines spill outside the body, and choanal atresia and stenosis that can cause life-threatening airway obstruction, requiring multiple corrective surgeries.
- Breast cancer.
- Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).
- Infertility.
- Obesity.
- Kidney failure.
- Parkinson’s disease.
A recent study used mice to replicate the chronic, long-term, low dose of atrazine that we’re exposed to through drinking water. Atrazine-exposed mice had poor motor coordination and balance, and performed significantly worse on tasks requiring memory, learning, and spatial navigation. Here’s why:
The mice’s atrazine-exposed brain cells were deficient in two neurotransmitters: dopamine, which plays a key role in movement, reward and motivation, and acetylcholine, essential for memory and learning. Their brain cells exhibited signs of neurodegenerative disease, including oxidative stress, inflammation, impairment of autophagy (the cells’ waste-removal system), and interruption of mitochondrial function (the cell’s power source).
The human atrazine experiment has gone on for too long already. We shouldn’t tolerate any more of the birth defects, infertility, neurodegenerative disease, and chronic health conditions this toxin is causing.
Please ban atrazine!
Thank you.
[Your Name]